"I need a friend"
Translation:Ninahitaji rafiki
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Someone explained the "na" as a tense marker, present tense. Which made more sense to me.
E.g earlier we learnt that "tutaonana baadaye"=see you later
Breaking "tutaonana" would go something like Tu = We ta (tense marker, future)= will onana = see each other (from verb "kuona"= to see)
I suppose it will make more sense when we learn other tenses
if you look in the tips, Phmeza, it has a box that shows nicely how na is for the present tense - super helpful
It seems like the verbs end with -i in negative form, but is this one an exception or what? asante
It appears you're confusing this with verbs that take -i in the negative form but -a otherwise.
Verbs usually end with vowels(or all?, not really sure...) and just because it ends with -i does not necessarily mean that if it ends in -i it is negative. It can though.
Negative verbs in present tense:
-Do not have the tense marker (-na-)
-Will take a negative subject pronoun marker instead of a positive one(Negative ones are Si-, hu-, ha-, hatu-, ham-, and hawa-, the non-negative ones are Ni-, U-, A-, Tu-, M-, Wa-)
-If the verb ends with -a in the positive, it will change to -i in the negative(which is where I think the confusion originated from) Example: Ninapenda becomes Sipendi
What about "Mimi ninahitaji rafiki"? It is not currently acceptable, but is it correct? Should I report it?
That means the same thing but is not the correct translation of the sentence. Ninahitaji rafiki moja means I need one friend
The "na" in ninahitaji shows what tense the needing is in. Past is nilihitaji and future is nitahitaji.
It isn't "na" as in "is", it's just that "nina" is the prefix for "I" need or run or whatever the verb is.
